Micro-blogging services, such as the Twitter® micro-blogging and social networking service, have become increasingly popular. The Twitter® micro-blogging and social networking service allows a user to post messages (i.e., tweets) that are then viewable by other users that subscribe to messages from the user (i.e., are “followers” of the user). The Twitter® micro-blogging and social networking service also allows users to insert hashtags in the form of #{keyword} (e.g., #musicmonday) into their tweets to identify relevant keywords or topics. The hashtags may then be used to search for tweets of interest. For example, a user may search for the hashtag #musicmonday in order to view all tweets including the hashtag #musicmonday. While, at this point, only the Twitter® micro-blogging and social networking service utilizes hashtags, hashtags could and are expected to be used in other existing or future micro-blogging services.
In addition, crowd-based services are also emerging. One exemplary crowd-based service is described in commonly owned and assigned U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0198828, entitled FORMING CROWDS AND PROVIDING ACCESS TO CROWD DATA IN A MOBILE ENVIRONMENT, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0197318, entitled ANONYMOUS CROWD TRACKING, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0198826, entitled MAINTAINING A HISTORICAL RECORD OF ANONYMIZED USER PROFILE DATA BY LOCATION FOR USERS IN A MOBILE ENVIRONMENT, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0198917, entitled CROWD FORMATION FOR MOBILE DEVICE USERS, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0198870, entitled SERVING A REQUEST FOR DATA FROM A HISTORICAL RECORD OF ANONYMIZED USER PROFILE DATA IN A MOBILE ENVIRONMENT, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0198862, entitled HANDLING CROWD REQUESTS FOR LARGE GEOGRAPHIC AREAS, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; and U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0197319, entitled MODIFYING A USER'S CONTRIBUTION TO AN AGGREGATE PROFILE BASED ON TIME BETWEEN LOCATION UPDATES AND EXTERNAL EVENTS, which published on Aug. 5, 2010; all of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference in their entireties.
What is needed is a system and method that leverages hashtags to provide crowd-based features.